Millions of South Africans are voting in what is expected to be the most pivotal general election since the end of apartheid. For months, polls have shown the ruling African National Congress (ANC) party could lose its majority for the first time since Nelson Mandela led it to power in 1994. While polling can be challenging in South Africa, most ...
Chinese leader Xi Jinping decried “tremendous sufferings” in the Middle East and called for an international peace conference as leaders from Arab nations visit Beijing this week amid mounting global concern over Israel’s war in Gaza. “Since last October, the Palestinian-Israeli conflict has escalated drastically, throwing the people into tremendous sufferings. War should not continue indefinitely. Justice should not be ...
North Korea has adopted a new strategy to contend with its southern neighbor: sending floating bags of trash containing “filth” across the border, carried by massive balloons. The South Korean military began noticing “large amounts of balloons” arriving from the North starting Tuesday night, detecting more than 150 as of Wednesday morning, according to the country’s Joint Chiefs of Staff ...
The war in Gaza will likely continue through at least the end of the year, an Israeli official warned Wednesday, seeming to dismiss the idea that fighting would end after the military offensive against Hamas in Rafah. Israel’s national security adviser, Tzachi Hanegbi, said the year 2024 has been “defined as a year of combat” by Israel’s war cabinet. “We ...
France and Germany said Tuesday that Ukraine should be allowed to use their weapons against targets inside Russia from which Moscow attacks Ukraine. Speaking at a news conference alongside German Chancellor Olaf Scholz on Tuesday, French President Emmanuel Macron outlined that French weapons sent to Ukraine, including long-range missiles, were permitted to target bases inside Russia. “Ukrainian soil is being attacked ...
China Coast Guard ships have been in waters around Japanese-controlled islands in the East China Sea for a record 158 consecutive days, according to Tokyo’s latest count released Monday, surpassing the previous record set in 2021. Analysts fear the uninhabited islands, known as the Senkakus in Japan and the Diaoyus in China, have the potential to become a flashpoint for ...
At least 45 people were killed and more than 200 others injured after a fire broke out following the Israeli military’s strike on the outskirts of Gaza’s southernmost city, most of them women and children, according to the Gaza Health Ministry and Palestinian medics. Israel’s escalating assault in Rafah – where some 1.3 million Palestinians were taking shelter before Israel began ...
Thailand’s former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra has been indicted on lese majeste charges, authorities said Wednesday, the latest twist in a decades-long political saga in the Southeast Asian kingdom. The case, filed by police, alleged Thaksin violated Thailand’s notoriously harsh royal insult law during an interview he gave in 2015 to the South Korean newspaper Chosun Ilbo. “The attorney general has decided ...
Cancer is often regarded as a disease of the modern age. However, medical texts from ancient Egypt indicate that healers of the time were aware of the condition. Now, new evidence from a skull more than 4,000 years old has revealed that ancient Egyptian physicians may have tried to treat certain cancers with surgery. The skull belonged to a man who ...
Pope Francis allegedly told Italian bishops to not permit gay men to train for the priesthood, with two Italian newspapers claiming that the 87-year-old pontiff made a homophobic slur in a closed-door meeting last week. Citing sources from inside the meeting, the Corriere della Sera and La Repubblica newspapers reported Monday that the Pope had made the comments while meeting ...